Chapter Text
Leo woke up late, as usual. The sounds of birds chirping, and people laughing and shouting wafted in through the open windows of Cabin 9.
Leo sat up and looked around. This was the last time he would be waking up at Camp Half Blood as a camper. After this he was going to New Rome University in California.
He got up and walked around. Looking at the photos on the walls of him and his siblings, tears started to form in his eyes. He walked back over to his bed and picked up his backpack, preparing to leave. As he did, an old photo fell out of an open pocket. It was a photo of himself with Piper and Jason on the day they arrived to camp half blood, three years ago.
As much as he was going to miss Camp Half Blood, he was so excited to see his friends again. Jason was already in California, helping out at Camp Jupiter. Piper was in Oklahoma spending the summer with her Girlfriend, Shel, but was planning on coming to New Rome for college.
'Only a couple weeks' Leo thought to himself.
Percy, Annabeth, Leo, and his girlfriend Calypso were planning on taking a road trip from New York to California to get to New Rome.
Now I'm sure you're thinking 'wouldn't it be easier just to fly?' and you'd be correct, except that flying wasn't really an option for Percy, and Leo and his friends didn't want to make Percy drive all by himself, they were nice like that.
Leo grabbed his stuff and walked out of Cabin 9 for the last time.
He went to the dining pavilion to have breakfast with his siblings. Most of the Hephaestus kids had already left but Nyssa and Harley where there waiting for him.
After he ate, he said his goodbyes to his siblings. Harley cried, as to be expected. They all hugged, and Leo left.
Leo wasn't quite sure about leaving Festus, his mechanical dragon at camp but Nyssa had said she would take care of him while she remained at camp.
He was probably going to miss that dragon more than his fellow campers. Machines were always easier to talk to and be with than people. They didn't have feelings to complicate things. If something was wrong with them, there was always a fix and there was always a right and wrong way to do it. No grey area. Not like Leo, there was no fix for him.
He found his friends hanging out by the canoe lake. "Leo! We were wondering when you were gonna get up!" Percy called as Leo got closer, "Yeah yeah" Leo chuckled.
"So, we have to stop by Sally's to drop off Will and Nico before we get on the road" Annabeth mentioned, "which means if we want to make any real progress today we need to leave in the next hour."
Leo sat down next Calypso and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
An hour later the 6 of them were crammed into Percy's ancient, beat up Sedan. "This is definitely not legal" Will said from under Nico's lap. The seating arrangement looked like this:
Percy Annabeth
Nico
Will Leo Calypso
Nico was the smallest so he had to sit on Will's lap.
"It'll be fine, we just have to make it to my mom's without running into monsters or getting pulled over" Percy said cheerfully "that's likely" Nico mumbled.
"Oh come on, for once can we have a positive attitude about something" Percy asked.
Surprisingly they made it all the way to Sally Jackson's apartment with no hiccups. Actually this wasn't true. Leo got the hiccups halfway through the drive, it was very annoying.
When they got there they all went up to the apartment for lunch and to get the snack and CDs that Sally had prepared for them.
Since demigods couldn't have electronics the only way they could listen to music was analog. Even the radio was off limits! So CDs it was!
They said goodbye to Nico and Will. They were staying with Sally and Paul and going to school together in New York.
Percy and his family said goodbye and Estelle, his little sister, started sobbing the moment he left. They could hear her crying all the way down the hall.
And they were off. In a much more comfortable arrangement. They were pleasantly surprised at the music Sally had chosen for them! There was a bit of everything, some songs they sang along to, some they made fun of ruthlessly.
By the time they reached California a week later, they had gone through all of Sally's CDs about 12 times.
"Only a few more hours till we reach New Rome" Annabeth said looking at the foldout map.
Leo perked up when he heard this. For the last 5 hours Leo had been zoning out, thinking about Jason and Piper, this was normal.
The three of them had been through so much together, from the whole Hera thing, and Gaea, to Piper and Jason breaking up.
When that happened Jason was devastated, he understood why Piper had broken up with him but it still hurt. Every night Jason and Leo would talk via Iris message, and it would usually go something like this:
"I just miss her so much, man" Jason would say
"I know, Jase" Leo would say
Jason would cry. Leo would cry, hiding it from Jason. It hurt him so much to see Jason cry like that.
Then they would sit in silence until Jason cried himself to sleep.
Leo would sit awake, thinking about Jason and what he would give to be able to give him a hug.
Piper and Jason were friends again now. Piper had a girlfriend Shel, and Jason had a new girlfriend he'd met at Camp Jupiter. Leo had never met Jason's new girlfriend, but Leo was unsure of her. How did he know if she was good enough for him?
Not just anyone was worthy of Jason Grace. Leo felt like this a lot, he wasn't sure he was worthy of Jason Grace either. He wasn't sure he was worthy of anyone, let alone Jason and his friends.
Leo thought about when Jason had woken up on the bus all those years ago, no memories, nothing. But he was holding Piper's hand, so Piper was his girlfriend. That was simple, but Piper had no say in that, Jason had no say in that. It was all Hera.
What would have happened if it was Leo holding Jason's hand when Jason woke up? "why do I keep thinking about this?" Leo muttered to himself.
He was brought out of it by Annabeth's announcement.